OXFORD Spires suffered their first setback of the season with a 48-42 defeat at home to Ipswich Witches in the Premiership.

A huge blow for Spires was losing Lewis Kerr with a suspected broken ankle during a Heat 11 fall, after he had won his opening two outings.

However, skipper Chris Harris produced a superb ride to pass Emil Sayfutdinov to win Heat 13, rounding him on the fourth bend, to defeat both the Russian and hand the only defeat of the night to 2017 world champion Jason Doyle.

Charles Wright came into Heat 14 as a tactical substitute and jetted from the tapes, while the action was behind. On the fourth bend of the second lap, Rohan Tungate spotted a gap and darted straight through the middle of Adam Ellis and Keynan Rew in a brilliant move.

The resultant 5-1 to Spires reduced the gap to just two points entering the final race.

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Doyle and Sayfutdinov got out in front in Heat 15, and despite the best efforts of Tungate and Harris, pulled away for a 5-1 to clinch victory for Witches.

The visitors held a narrow lead throughout the evening, and until the final two heats, neither side scored a maximum 5-1 heat win.

Tungate top scored for Spires with 11+1, and he said: “Ipswich are very strong in the closing races, because they’ve got both Emil and Doyley in Heats 13 and 15.

“You need to hit them hard in the early stages and then you can turn them over, but they’re pretty dangerous towards the end of the night.

“It was nice to make that move in Heat 14, to get through the Ipswich riders and join Charles for the 5-1. We then needed a little bit more, but I’m satisfied with my own night.

“I do feel I’ve getting more used to the Oxford track. I’ve still got stuff to do with engines, but it’s going in the right direction and I’m just going to continue working hard.

“It’s only one loss. We won the first three meetings leading into tonight, so we can’t dwell too much on just one defeat. We’ll just move onto the next meeting and focus on that.”

Oxford Mail:

Spires boss Peter Schroeck added: “Of course we’re disappointed with the result. We gave ourselves a real chance at the end and to just fall short isn’t what we wanted, but we’ll pick ourselves up and move on.

“Ipswich are a strong team and fair play to Ritchie [Hawkins, Witches team manager], the riders and their supporters. The racing was first class and it was great to see the terraces packed for what would’ve been a great meeting for the neutral.

“It was a blow to lose Lewis, who is going for additional checks to try and get to the bottom of the issue. We’ll keep our fingers crossed for a positive outcome from that.”